


V^^' 













"^ ^^ ♦t. 



^-^^ 





















.0'^ "^. 



J.^'^ 

'i:^ % 



^V ^ „ 



^ ••«« 



















dP'9^ 



















[•- **..** .-iS^i-. X.^* 






,4> -L . . . 



>^-nK 







O V 




jy... V 



THE UNION. 



SPEECH 



OK 



WILLIAM H. SEWAED, 

il 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 

ON PKESENTING THE NEW YORK [JNION PETJTJON 
JANUARY ;n ISC.l. 




Mr. SEWARD said: 

Mr. President: I have received a communica- 
tion tVom Mr. A. A. Low, Jcunes A. Gallatin, 
Peter Cooper, and others, who are a committee 
of twenty-five citizens of New York, who are 
charged with the duty of presentinij to the Sen- 
ate of the United Stati-s the petition of the inhab- 
itants of that city, praying for the exercise of the 
best wisdom of Congress in finding .some plan for 
the adjustment of the troubles wliicJi di.slurb the 
peace ai:d happiness and endanger the safety of 
the nation. In compliance with their request, 1 
waive tlie reading of the memorial, and ask that 
the Senate will indulge me with allowing to be 
read at the Secretary's desk, the resolutions the 
committee have adopted in regard tu the views 
they desire to present. i 

The Secreliiry read, as follows: 1 

Report of the special committee to a meclin^at the roorwiof \ 

the Chamber of Commerce, Saturday, January "^0, 1861. I 

Tlie spficial committee to whom wiis iissistn'il the duty 
of digestiiis and presenting a proper basis ol' action for tl>e ; 
committee charged Vifitli the presentation to t'oiigross of i 
the memorial of citizens of ?Jew York, praying thai sncli 
measun^s may be; adopted by Congress as will restore trail- I 
(|uillityand peace to our now distracted country, beg leave i 
respectfully to report: 

That, since the last meeting of the memorial committee, 
a legislative printi'd document has been received, slated : 
to embrace propositions for an adjustment of pending dif- I 
ticulties heuvceu the northern and southern States, agreed ; 
upon by a committee of ihe border States, including Ijela- 
ware, Maryland, Virginia, Kennicliy, Missouri, and North ; 
Carolina, Irom the South; and New Jersey, I'eimsylvaiiia, j 
Ohio, Iniliana, and Illinois, from the North. These prop ' 
ositions contemplate boiii-acts of It-gislation and amend- | 
menls of the Constitution, and which, with some nnKiiti- 
cations and additions, are as follows, and which tin; spcicial 
committee adopt as part of this their repryrt. which they 
submit I'or the consideration of the memori^jl eommittet-, 
and respectfully reccnunend for their adoption as the basis 
of their action under the memorial, and in lurtherance of 
iti objects. 

Mr. SEWARD. Mr. President, excepting the 
House of RepreseiUativcs, this Senate Chamber 
is the largest hall that is, or ever has been, occu- 
pied by a legislative assembly since the world 



began. The memorial which I am charged to pre- 
sent is of such a length that, if extendi d, it would 
cross the Senate Chamber, in itsextremest length, 
eighteen times. I have already presented menio- 
rials from the city of New York signed by ciij- 
zeiis of that plact; to the number of twenty-five 
thousand This memorial bears the signatures of 
thirty-eight thousand mtn-e, making, in the whole, 
sixty-three thousand of the inhabitants of that 
city who have signed this appeal to the Senate. 
Th'e committee who have charg(M)f this memorial 
are a fair representation — I might almost say an 
embodiment — of the ciiizmis who direct and wield 
the commerce of the great emporium of our coun- 
try, the commerce of a continent, and a commerce 
which this present Viar, owing to tin,' distractions 
of the times, is put, for the first time, in the con- 
dition of proving itself to be the controlling com- 
merce of the world. The .memorial which they 
present may be regarded as a fair expression of 
the interest which is felt by that great r;ommercial 
community, and probably a fair exponimt of the 
interest in the same great subject which is felt by 
the wholecoinmercial inlerestof the United States. 
In any other part of the world, such a communi- 
cation would' command obedience. In England, 
France, Russia, Piussia, or Germany, a demon- 
stration of the will of tlie commerce of the coun- 
try decides the questions of war or of peace. 
Happily, sir, that is not the ca.si; in this great Re- 
public. The interest of commcrci; is butone. The 
interest of agriculture, manufactures, and mining, 
each of them, is another. Each is entitled to, and 
each secures, equal respect; and the consideration 
which they obtain is due, not to their number, not 
to their wealth, but is due to the circumstances 
under which they lend theirndvice to the Govern- 
ment. But I do not hesitate to say that the char- 
acter of these petitioners eniilli.' them to the re- 
spectful attention and consideration of Congress. 
They have asked me to support this petition. 
I have not yet found, though i have anxiously 



* :> 



9 



waited and hoped for, that manifestation of tem- 
per on the part of the people of the country and 
their representatives which would justify me in 
saying that the seceding States, or those who sym- 
pathize with tiiem, have made propositions which 
the citizens of the adhering States could accept; 
or, as 1 desire to speak with impartiality upon 
this as upon all other occasions, to put the prop- 
osition ill another form, that this or any other of 
the various propositions which have come from 
citizens of the adhering States, or those who de- 
sire to adhere to the Union, would be acceptable 
and satisfactory to the other party. I have thought 
it my duty to hold myself open and ready for the 
best adjustment which could be practically made; 
and I have therefore been obliged to ask this com- 
mittee to be content with the assurance that I would 
■express to the public and to the Senate that the 
spirit in which they come is perfectly commend- 
aijle and perfectly satisfactory. It is gratifying 
to me to see that the proper spirit, the spirit of 
fraternal kindness, of conciliation and affection, 
is adopted by so large a portion of my felipw-cil- 
izens of the State to which I belong. 

I have asked them, also, in return for perform- 
ing my duty on this occasion, that when they have 
arrived at home, they will act in the same spirit 
and manifest their devotion to the Union above all 
other interests and all other sentiments, by speak- 
ing for the Union, by voting for the Union, and 
if it should be demanded by lendingand even giv- 
ing their money for the Union, and fighting in the 
last resort f(n- the Union, taking care always that 
speaking goes before voting, voting goes before 
giving money, and all go before a battle, which I 
should regard as hazardous and dangerous, and 
therefore the last, as it would be the most painful 
measure to be resorted to for the salvation of the 
Union. 

This is the spii'it in which I have determined 
for myself to come up to this great question, and 
to pass through it, as I sincerely believe we shall 
pass through it. For, although this great contro- 
versy has not been already settled, 1 do not, there- 
fore, any the less calculate upon and hope and 
ex]:>ect that it will be peacefully settled, and set- 
tled for the Union. I have not been so rash as to 
expectthatin sixty days, which have been allowed 
to us since the meeting of Congress — and I will 
be frank, sir, in saying that I have not expected 
that in the ninety days which are the allotted term 
of Congress — this great controversy would cer- 
tainly be adjusted, peace restored, and the Union 
firmly reestablished. I knew, sir, that sixty days, 
or ninety days, was the term that was fixed with 
definite objects and purposes by that portion of 
my fellow-citizens who have thought that it would 
advance the interests of the States to which they 
belonged to dissever the Union. I liave not ex- 
pected that reason and judgment would come 
back to the people and become so pervading, so 
universal, as that they would appreciate the dan- 

fer and be able to agree on the remedies. Still, 
have been willing that it should be tried, though 
unsuccessfully; but my confidence has remained 
the same, for this simple reason: that as I have 
not believed that the passion and frenzy of the 
hour could overturn tiiis great fabric of constitu- 



tional liberty and empire in ninety days, so I have 
felt sure that there would be time, even after the 
expiration of ninety days, for the restoration of 
all that had been lost, and for the reestablishment 
of all that was in danger. 

A great many and very various interests and 
elements are brought into conflict in this sudden 
crisis; a great many personal ambitions; a great 
many sectional interests; and it would be strange 
if they could all be accommodated and arranged 
and harmonized, so as to admit and give full effect 
to the one profoundest, strongest, and most en- 
during seniiment or passion of the United States 
— that of devotion to the Union. These, whether 
you call them secession or revolution on the one 
side, or coercion or defiance on the other, are all 
to subside and pass away before the Union is to 
become the grand absorbing object of interest, 
affection, and duty, upon the part of the citizens 
of the United States. A great many partisan in- 
terests are to be repressed, suppressed, and to 
give place — partisan interests expressed by the 
Charleston platform, by the Baltimore platform, 
by the Chicago platform, and by the popular sov- 
ereignty platlbrm — if indeed the Union is in dan- 
ger and is to be saved; and with these interests, 
and with these platforms, everybody standing 
upon them or connected with them, is to pass 
away, if the Union is in danger and is to be saved, 
before the Union can be saved. Rut it will require 
a very short time, if this Union is in danger and 
does recjuire to be saved, for all these interests 
and all these )5latforms and all these men to dis- 
appear. You and I, and every one who shall 
oppose, resist, stand in the way of the preserva- 
tion of this Union, will appear but as moths on 
a summer evening, when the whirlwind of popu- 
lar indignation arises that shall be excited at the 
full discovery that this Union is endangered 
through faction, or even impracticability on our 
part. 

I have hope, confidence, that all this is to come 
around just as I have said, and quite soon enough; 
because I perceive, although we may shut our 
eyes to it, that the country and mankind- cannot 
shut their eyes to the true nature of this crisis. 
There has been a real, a vital question in this 
country for twelve years at least — a question of 
slavery in tiie Territories of the United States. It 
was strongest in its development in 1850, when 
all the Pacific coast, and all the territory interven- 
ing between it and the Louisiana purchase, were 
thrown upon our hands all of a sudden, for the 
purpose of our organizing in them free and inde- 
pendent republican governments, as a basis of 
future States. It has been an earnest, and, I regret 
to say, an angry controversy; but the admission 
of Kansas into the Union yesterday settled at least 
all tliat was vital or important in the question, 
leaving behind nothing but the. passions which 
the contest had engendered. Kansas is in the 
Union; California and Oregon are in the Union; 
and now the same contest divides and distracts 
this Union for freedom and slavery in the Terri- 
tories of the United States, just as before. 

What is the extent of tiie Territories which re- 
main after the admission of Minnesota, of Ore- 
gon, of California, and of Kansas.' One million 



sixty-three thousand five lu.ndred «,id seven 
square miles an ann twenty-four times that of 
the State of New ^ ork, the hi,-estof the old and 
fully developed States. Twenty-four such States 
as his of New York arc yet to he oi-ani/.ed 
within the remaining Territories of the "United 
^tates. iNow, under what is accepted by the 
Administration of the Government jis a judieial 
decree, upheld by it, put in practical operation bv 
it.every inch uf that territory is slave territory 
—1 speak of that decision not as 1 accept it but 
as It IS accepted and enforced by the existin- 
Administratmn— every foot of it slave territory 
as much as South Carolina. Over a considerable 
portion of It a slave code, made by a Government 
created by the Congress of the United States, is 
enforced ; so that, according to the claims of those 
who insist upon a right in the territory of the 
United States for slavery, the whole of this one 
million sixty-tnree thousand square miles is slave N 
territory. How many slaves are there in it ' I 
How many have been brought into it durin- i 
these twelve years in which it has been not only 
relinquished to slavery, but in which the court 
and the Legislature and the Administration have I 
maintained, protected, defended, and guarantied 
slavery there? Twenty-four African slaves; one ' 
slave for every forty-four thousand square miles; 
one slave for every one of the twenty-four States 
which, supposing them each to be of the dimen- 
sions ol ISew^ork or Pennsylvania or Indiana 
are to cover that portion of the area of our Re- 
pubhc. Sir, I have followed this thing in good 

ha e'n'''r "'"'r"",'^ '"''■-y' but I confess that I 
ave no fears of slavery now whore, in the pecu- 

har condition of things which has^xisted, slavery 
has succeeded in planting only one slave upon 
every forty-four thousand square miles of terri- 
tory. 

This then, has ceased to be a practical ques- 
tion In heu of It comes up a great and vital and 
tearful question— the question of Union or of dis- 
solution of the Union; the question of country or 
of no country; the question of hope, the question 
of greatness, or the question of sinking forever 
under the contempt of mankind. Wny, then, 
should I despair that a great people of thirty mil- 
lion will be able to meet this crisis? I have no 
fear This is a Confederacy. It is not an impe- 
rial Government, nor the government of a sin-le 
State; It i.s a Confederacy; and it is, as it ought to 
be, dependent upon the continued assent of all the 
members of the Confederacy to its existence, and 
subject to dissolution by their action; but that as- 
sent is to be always taken by virtue of the orV 
pnal assent and held, until, in the form prescribed 
by the Constitution itself, and in the time and in 
the manner and with all the conditions which the 
Constitution prescribes, those who constitute the 
Union .shall declare that it shall be no lono-er The 
thirty day.s and sixty days and ninety days given 

s by the d.sun.onists may not be enough for 
heir policy and their purposes. I hope and trust 
that It may be time enough for the policy and 
purposes of the lovers of tlie Union. God -rant 
that It may be so! But if this term shalUurTi out - 

ot to be enough, then I see how and when all 
the.se great controversies will be settled, just as . 



our forefathers foresaw when they framed the 
Con.st„ution. They provided, seve.fty years ago, 
i.at thi.s present controversy, this whoi eontfo- 
UM-sy shall be submitted to the people of the 
United States in convention, called according a 
the forms of the Constitution, and actin- in the 
I manner pi-escr,bed by it. Then, sir, thTs coun- 
t.y will find sudden relief in the promj.t and unan- 
imous adoption of the measures necessary f\jr its 
salvation and the world will see how well and 
how wise y a great, enlightened, educated, Chris- 
j nan people, consisting of thirty-four sovereign 
States, can adjust difficulties which had seemJd 
I even to themselves as well as to mankind, to be 
I insurmountable. ' 

j Mr. MASON (after other remarks) said: I can 
[ understand, Mr. President, what the Senator 
means when he recommends to his constituents 
I to speak for the Union; we have had a great deal 
I of that; I can understand what he means when he 
I recommends them to vote for the Union, because 
iie coupled It with a recommendation that they 
should go lino State convention; but I demand to 
know what he means by their contributing money 
for the Union. ^ •' 

xMr. SEWARD. I will explain to the honorable 
Senator If he wishes. During the present ses- 
sion of Congress, the Government of this Union 
I has seen a sudden depreciation of its credit. From 
I one condition of things which existed a year or 
, two ago, when all the stocks of the Union were at 
: : a premium, they have fallen until recently, at one 
time, the credit of the Union was at a discount of 
; thirty per cent., while the credit of the State of 
iNew York, on her six per cent, stock, all the 
wlule commands a premium. The commercial 
! community, who to-day petition Congress, have 
the treasure of the commercial city in their keep- 
1 1 ing 1 have recommended to these gentlemen here, 
publicly, as I have heretofore recommended to 
them privately, that they should advance to the 
U nion money on loans and on Treasury notes, as 
t ley are now furnishing in that way to the Unioi> 
the funds with which the President of the United 
States, the Departments, the Congress, the courts, 
yourself and myself, the Senator from Virginia! 
tlie Army, x^avy, and every other branch of the 
Government, IS actually sustained. I have rec- 
ommended to them, in this crisis, that they sus- 
tain the Government of their country with the 
'^'■edit to which it is entitled at their hands. 

Mr. MASON. I presumed that that was the 
use intended to be made of the money which the 
Senator advised his constituents to contribute to. 
the Union. I did not, in my own mind, do the 
honorable Senator the injustice to believe that he 
proposed, with the money which was to be con- 
tributed, to subsidize or to debauch the southern 
States I had no such view. I took it forgrantcd 
that the money was to sustain the Army which 
was to conduct the fight that he recommends to 
Ills people. 

Mr. SEWARD. Mr. President, the honora- 
ble Senator, I am sure, does not mean to do mfe 
injustice. 

iMr. MASON. Certainly not; and if the hon- 
orable Senator wishes to correct me, I yield with 
great pleasure. 



4 



Mr. SEWARD. I contemplated, sir, after the !! which, for obvious reasons, I refrain from com 



expiration of all the multitudinous trials they are 
making to save this Union by compromise, a con- 
vention of the people of the United States, called 
in constitutional form; and when that shall have 
been held, or refused to be held, and found to be 
impossible to obtain; if then, this Union is to 
stand or fiiU by the force of arms, I have advised 
my people to do, as I shall be ready to do myself, 
stand in the breach, and stand with it or perish 
with it. [Applause in the galleries.] 

Mr. MASON. Then we have it definite, Mr. 
President. I want to bring the honorable Sena- 
tor, the exponent of the new Administration, to 
the policy wiiich is to be adopted. I understand 
from him" now, that remedies failing through the 
Constitution by the conventions of the States, his 
recommendation is battle and bloodshed to pre- 
serve the Union; and his recommendation to his 
people is, that they shall contribute the money 
which shall march the Army upon the South; for 
what .' To preserve the Union ? It is gone; it is 



menting on, therefore their States are gone and the 
Union is gone with them. Sir, the Senate Cham- 
ber is here; the States are here; the Union is here 
still. Flere the)'- will all be; and I expect that, in 
the exercise of public reason, the free choice of 
these States, these places will all be filled. If I 
contemplate in any case that it may be necessary 
to fight for this Union, it is because treason and 
sedition may arise, not alone or only in a State of 
the South, but in States of the North, anywhere 
and everywhere, be excited and armed, so as to 
assail the Union; and whenever it shall come to 
that, whether it is in my own State or in any other 
I State of the Union, then I expect that, whatever 
j can be done having been done — as I liave already 
; indicated that all shall be done whicli reason can 
1 do — then I expect that what is right to be done 
I shall be done in the way in v.'hich treason in the 
I last resort is necessarily as well as lawfully met. 
! Mr. MASON. Mr. President, giving the hon- 
orable Senator the full advantage of his present 



broken: there is no Union now in this country, ji commentary upon the speech that preceded it, I 
Those States that are out of the Union have broken j yet place before the American people the fact that 



it as completely as if, instead of six or seven, 
there were now all the fifteen slave States with 
them; and if this battle is to be fought, it is to be 
fought against them upon their own soil, for the 
purpose of reducing them to colonies and depend- 
encies. It cannot mean anything else. The hon- 
orable Senator is too wise and experienced a 
statesman, the honorable Senator knows too well 
the construction and theory of this Government, 
to think for one moment that when you have sub- 
jugated the people of the States, you have restored 
the Union. 

Mr. SEWARD. I look, sir, to no such con- 
tingency as seceded States and a dissevered Union. 
I look to no such condition of things. The hon- 
orable Senator and I differ in regard to tlie future. 
He, wiih an earnest will and ardent imagination, 
sees this country hereafter rent and dissevered, 
and then recombined into separate confederacies. 
I see no such thing in the future; but I do see, 
through the return of rertson and judgment to the 
American people, a return of public harmony, 
and the consolidation of the Union firmer than 
ever before. The honorable Senator from Vir- 
ginia can very easily see that we may differ in our 
anticipations and expectations of the future, be- 
cause we differ so much in regard to thi> actual, 
living present. Here I am, sir, in the Union of 
the United States, this same blessed, glorious, 
nobly-inherited, God-given Union, in the Senate 
Chamber of the United States, pleading for it, 
maintaining it, and defending it. 

The honorable Senator from Virginia says it is 
gone, there is no Union; and yet he is hereon this 
same floor with me. Where, then, is he.' In the 
Union or out of the Union ? He is actually pres- 
ent here; and in spite of himself, I hold him to be 
still with mj'^self in this glorious old Union. I will 
not strain the remark, wliich he means to put forth 
with candor and frankness. I therefore assume 
that he infers that because some other Senators 
were here a short time ago, his associates and 
mine, and are not here now, but have withdrawn, 
under circumstances known to the world, and 



he proposes but one remedy, either to preserve 
this Union or to restore itj and that is the ultima 
ratio regum. 

Mr. SEWARD. Not to restore— preserve. 

Mr. MASON. I will take his own language. 
Let the facts be what they may, he presents but 
one remedy — the argument of the tyrant — force, 
compulsion, power. This is the only resort that 
the honorable Senator has evinced, either in hi.s 
speech or in his commentary. He says he is for 
punishingseditionand treason, whether it is found 
)n the South or jn the North. That is the only 
remedy that he proposes upon the existing fects. 
He takes no account of there being organized 
political communities, claiming to be sovereign, 
claiming to have resumed all sovereign powerthat 
they had once delegated to this Confederacy, now 
out of the Union; actually, completely outside; 
with not a Federal officer within their limits; with 
all Federal authority denied, abrogated; with laws 
punishing as treason at home any obedience to 
authority abroad; and the honorable Senator still 
says we know nothing of all that. It is the pur- 
pose of the Government, as I understand him, to 
ignore all that, as though it di.d not exist; and be 
it one man or a local combination that are resist- 
ing the laws, or be it three, or five, or ten million 
people, who are resisting the law, still it is trea- 
son and sedition, and he knows of no remedy but 
force ! 

Sir, I wanted to bring him to that point. I 
wanted, of all others, that the people of my hon- 
ored State of Virginia should know it, that the 
scales should fall from their eyes, if any there are 
there. I am aware of the miserable, puny, pusil- 
lanimous attempt to hoodwink the minds and 
judgment of that people by crying, "Peace, 
peace," when there is no peace. I point them now 
to the remedies proposed by the most potent ia 
the councils of the new Government, when it is to 
come in. [ point them to the four great remedies 
that are ^o heal these breaches in the Union and 
preserve it, to use the language of the honorable 
Senator. Speaking for it will not do; voting will 



not do; because tliasu men wlio nre to be parties 
to the voting; are outside of the Union, and will 
not vote. Moni'y! money! How is money to 
do it? Tile honorable Senator lias disclosed it. 
Not by demoralizinn; and subsidizing:: by bribery, 
but using it as the sinews of war. Alonoy is to 
do it, anil is to \n^ contrii)uted by the jjreat com- 
mercial city of New York, under the counsels 
of the lionorable Senator who represents them. 
Money is to be contributed as the sinews of war, 
because the very next in the four acts of the drama 
that is to be enacted is battle, battle ! 

Now, sir, let my people understand this. If 
there be any among them so puny as to be deluded 
by the idle elforts to circulate papers among them, 
slating that " there are propositions for constitu- 
tional amendment which will be carried — propo- 
sitions that will secure your rights in the Union 
— be patient, like good children, and wait your 
time" — if there be any among the manhood of 
the whole South puny enough to be deceived by 
such contrivances as those, I point them to the 
words of the honorable Senator, showing that 
money and war are looked to to reduce them, and 
these alone. 

I know, Mr. President, it is, perhaps, an in- 
(li-mity of my temperament to appear to exhibit 
something like angry emotion, when I donotfeel 
it. I have none, sir; none. Men who are upon 
the eve of measuring swords conduct themselves 
in a gentle mood to each other, and use no lan- 
guage of menace, or of thn'at, far less terms of 
indignity. 

Sir, I trust we may avoid the ullimaralioof the 
Senator from New York. If it be in the provi- 
dence of the speedy future that these slave States 
are to confederate, and to form an independent 
Government, with a nationality and a flag, an or- 
ganization and an army and a navy and credit — 
if that be reserved in the unspoken speedy future 
— I trust that the good sense, the humanity, the 
civilization, the regard for unborn posterity, will 
lead the people, both North and South, to repu- 
diate the counsels of the honorable Senator from 
New York. I shall look to their good sense, tlieir 
humanity, their civilization, to interpose the broad 
(Zgis of the popular will to avoid the only resort 
that the honorable Senator looks to — that of force 
and subjugation. 

Sir, I have told gentlemen whom I liave met 
here from other States — honored and honorable 
men, who have come as volunteers really upon a 
mission of peace and tranquillity — that it was man- 
ifest, in the state of facts now existing, there was 
great and imminiMit danger of a collision between 
the sections, and that all those who desired to 
preserve the Union, in my judgment, should make 
it the first and great work to avoid that collision, 
and to avoid the civil war that must ensue when 
men's minds really are heated to madness, when 
passion usurps the throne of reason, and when 
negotiation and deliberation are ended. Those 
have been my counsels. What are those of the 
honorable Senator from New York? Here with 
hostile fleets and armies arrayed against each other 
in two of the southern States; here when we are 
in momentary expectation of hearing of a collis- 
ion between them, what are the counsels of the 



i honorable Senator from New York ? Speak for 
the Union; vote for the Union; contribute money 
for the Union; and, last of nil, fight t".>r the Union. 

1 1 re))eat it, sir, 1 trust the good .sense, the wis- 
dom, tiie civilization, the luimanily of the age, 
will rescue tjiis country from the counsels of tin.' 
honorabli; Senator from New Yorlc. 

Bui, Mr. President, they will liave this eflfcct 
at least: if that potency wiiich is ascribed to the 

' opinions of that honorable Senator, delivered and 
pronounced in his place here as a Senator, belong 

; to him, it will admonish the people now meeting 
in their sovereign capacity in convention in all 
the southern States, to let the di-lusion pass — the 
idle delusion that they are to havi; any security 
in this Government by amendments to the Con- 
stitution. They are not onlj' not proposed, but 
they arc denied and derided. We have now for 

: the first time distinctly shadowed forth that, which 
I confess, among others, I had seriously appre- 
liended, that the counsels of the leaders would be 
force, force. We have it now avowed — openly 
avowed. I trust the scales will fall from their eyes. 

j I trust that in the free States, the non-slavehold- 

I ing States, there is a body of good men, of wise 
and enlightened patriotism, freed sufiiciently from 
the shackles of jiarty obligations to see the con- 
sequences to which such counsels must lead — a 
war to restore this Union, or to preserve it, and 
that tlicy, men of sense in their generation, shall 
be deluded into a war under the idle pretext that 
they are only enforcing the laws and punishing 
treason and sedition. I appeal to the free States, 
the non-slaveholdingStates, to repudiate the coun- 
sels of the Senator from New York, and disown 
them. If in the providence of God it is to result 
that we are to separate into two confederacies, I 
trust that not the counsels of the honorable Sen- 
ator from New York, but the counsels of peace 
will prevail as the only counsels which can avert 
that greatest of all calamities, a war between 
brother and brother; a war which could conquer 
a peace only in oceans of blood and countless mil- 
lions of treasure. When the peace came, would 
you find a free people ? Would you find a people 
capable of reconstructing the Government? No. 
You would find a people subjugated and crouching 
under the tread of the despot, and you would find 
the warrior clad in arms with the money contrib- 
uted under the counsels of the honorable Senator 
from New York. That would be the result of 
war, and that is the; only result to which such 
counsels would lead. 

Mr. President, 1 earnestly trust, if, in despite of 
those counsels and those eflorts that are now mak- 
ing, under the mediation of the honored State 
which I am here to represent to restore harmony 
and to restore agovernmcnt, should fail, that there 
is an enlightened patriotism in this country and 
in all the States, that will agree to a separation in 
peace, and repudiate the counsels of the Senator 
from New York. 

Mr. SEWARD. Mr. President, I have been 
surprised at the delusion which the lionorable 
Senator from Virginia has been able to practice 
upon himself, so as to make out of a speech, peace- 
ful, fraternal, cordial, such as I have made, a dec- 
laration of war. I cannot account for it, how it 



6 



is that, wliile his sense of honor remains clear 
and bright — as I confess with pleasure it does — 
he avoids by design personalities which might 
irritate, yet his judgment is, somehow or other, 
so under the influence of his passion that he can 
see nothing but war in a speech which proposes 
simply this: that since this Union is in danger, 
every other question should be subordinate to the 
consideration and the removal of that danger by 
the pacific, constitutional action of the American 
people; by speech first, by vote, by consultation, 
by supplying and maintaining the credit of the 
Government, and, in the last alternative, after 
having exhausted all the existing means of set- 
tlement, and all others that might be suggested; 
and, finally, after a constitutional convention of 
the United States, called in the forms of the Con- 
stitution — then, to stand by this good old flag, 
and, if it is to fall from its eminence, be wrapped 
in its folds. 

Sir, that honorable Senator could have recol- 
lected that I came into the committee of thirteen; 
that I listened to every proposition that was made ; 
that I gave it deliberate — will any one say it was 
not fraternal ? — consideration. Will any one say 
that I offered no prejudices, no concessions, to pro- 
pitiate an arrangement? Which one of all the prop- 
ositions that have been made have I refused to 
consider? None. When 1 have voted to substi- 
tute a constitutional provision for the settlement 
of this question, such as that which was ofi'ered 
by the honorable Senator from New Hampshire, 
[Mr. Clark,] in preference to the proposition 
which requires us to take, in an unconstitutional 
and ineffectual way, the sentiments of the people 
on the proposition of the honorable Senator from 
Kentucky, did I do it in a spirit otherwise than 
that which belongs to a representative of the peo- 
ple who seeks concessions? In regard to this very 
proceedingof the honorable Senator's State which 
he so proudly commends, and in terms to which | 
I respond, have I not recommended to my own , 
State, and is it not acting, in sending commis- j 
sioners to meet the other States in that conven- i 
tion ? Does not the honorable Senator know that 
the State of New York stands ready to hear and | 
consider every plan, whether within the forms of 
the Constitution or without them, to settle this 
question peacefully and without resort to the 
sword, and that I am with the State of New York 
in that action ? It is simply because I have learned 
from the interest in which — the honorable Senator 
will excuse me for saying — I understood him to 
speak, that neither any suggestion that has been 
made yet and considered, nor any that that con- 
vention can make and consider and submit, or any 
other that has yet been projected, will be satis- 
factory to that interest of secession or disunion in 
which interest he speaks. I then have submitted 
alone that further one: that when all these have 
failed, then the States of this Union, according to 
the forms of the Constitution, and in the spirit in 
which it was made, shall take up this controversy 
about twenty-four negro slaves scattered over a ter- 
ritory of one million fifty thousand square miles, 
and say, whether, with the lionorable Senator 
from Virginia, they are willing to sacrifice all this 
liberty, all this greatness, all this happiness, and 



all this hope, because they have not intelligence, 
wisdom, and virtue enough toadjust a controversy 
so frivolous and contemptible. 

Mr. MASON. I will yield the floor in an in- 
stant to the Senator from Illinois. I do not know 
by what authority the Senator from New York 
says that I speak in a certain interest. 

Mr. SEWARD. I certainly should be very 
sorry if I have said anything unkind or disre- 
spectful to tlie honorable Senator — [Mr. Mason. 
" Not at all. ' '] — because the relations between him 
and myself, especially his bearing on this occa- 
sion, forbid me to do so. I understand the hon- 
orable Senator to speak in the interest, that is, in 
behalf of — I will withdraw (lie word "interest" — 
but in behalf of, sympathy for, those citizens in 
several of the States who have availed themselves 
of the power of the States to pass ordinances of 
secession, with the intention not again to come 
into the Union of tlie United States, if they can 
prevent it. I beg the honorable Senator's pardon 
if I have misunderstood him. I hope he will not 
be excited by that. 

Mr. MASON. There is nothing at all to ex- 
cite in what the honorable Senator meant, or in 
his language. I only want to know how he 
ascribed to me the position of speaking in any par- 
ticular interest. Now, the honorable Senator, as 
I understand him, means to assume that there are 
those who desire, as a preferable condition of the 
country, a separation of these States; but the hon- 
orable Senator has no authority on earth to class 
me among them. I am speaking, sir, in the in- 
terests of the State of Virginia, as I understand 
them as her Senator; and I am speaking upon that 
class of opinionswhich 1 know belong to Virginia, 
and certainly belong to me, that we will never re- 
main as constituents of this Confederacy unless 
there are provided, in some mode, guarantees that 
shall be effectual, beyond doubt, for the preser- 
vation of those rights that are necessary to our 
safety and to our honor. 

Why, sir, the honorable Senator knows that 
; the State of Virginia, upon a great and most dis- 
turbing cause of dift'erence between the States, has 
made a distinct proposition, and has said in lan- 
guage, repudiating anything like diplomacy, that 
it is one which Virginia would accept. That is 
her language. She has made a distinct proposi- 
tion upon this question of slavery in the Territo- 
ries, so that Senators are not uninformed of what 
one of the States, at least, would be satisfied with 
in reference to this disputed question of slavery 
in the Territories. 

Mr. DOUGLAS. I was pained this morning 
when the honorable Senator from New York made 
a speech, conciliatory and patriotic, showing every 
desire to have these matters amicably arranged, if 
possible, that, instead of being met in the spirit 
in which it was oficred, his advance was again 
repelled,asif there was alarm and fear lest reason, 
moderation, and justice might return, and the 
Union men, north and south — the conservative 
men — might possibly agree upon some basis of 
settlement. I have not been able to conceal from 
my eyes that there are gentlemen on this side of 
the Chamber who do not want any settlement. 
I saw it the otiier day when the vote was taken 



on sxibKtitiitincjthp proposition of thn Senator from 
Now Hampshire [Mr. Ci.ark] for that of tin: Sen- 
ator from Iventucky. The extremists on the otlier 
side received some aid from extreme men on this 
side by affirmative votes, and still more assist- 
ance by men on tliisside rutaininj^ their seats and 
refusing to voti', tlins perniittinic tbe proposition 
of the Senator from New Hampsiiire to be adopted 
in consequence of their refusal to vote against it, 



and instantly sitting down at their tables and 
writingand sendingolV telegraphic dispatches that 
there was no hope, because the lilacic Republicans 
had voted down the proposition of the Senator 
from Kentucky! I have witnessed these things 
here with pain; but it is no longer worth while to 
conceal from ourselves the fact that the extremists 
on this side and on the other side are in concert, 
from different motives, to defeat a settlement. 



Printed at the ofiice of the Congressional Globe. 



^y&j 



I 





























^ .<^ ... <i. -"• .*«■* . . . *^* *^^ .<^ ... <i. '•• •• .*<>* .. 




























'bV^ 



1 "» • o 










.0** \ 




Ks-T- 




<y 





"oV" 







""^S^ 

^^'% 





V-^^ 

./%. 



3^ o«'**.'^0 




♦ AT ^ 



Ho^ 








-^^0^ 




^n* V ''Trr* A 







'bV 




AW -^ - • ■ - ^' vx. -•,!- AV ^'» 



i>'-"^v' \*'^-V ^""i^^'j 




%.*^ 






'>uv^' -'^Kffi^.^ '-^^^^ oV'^^lMEV- 'j^v* 



:- '^^0^ i 



^''^t. 








kp-?!. 



-^ cp\.^j^^>. >^\.i^.v .oo^.is^•>o u*^'. 



V* 




V 







